"In the Mood for Love  is probably the most breathtakingly gorgeous film of the year, dizzy with a nose-against-the-glass romantic spirit that has been missing from the cinema forever. . . . As in Mr. Wong's film, yearning becomes the epoxy that holds the material together. . . . This film is a sweet kiss blown to a time long since over, a time that may have existed only in the movies, with ballads recorded in mono while hand-sewn clothing lay perfectly over the bodies of the stars. In the Mood for Love  is just that."
    - Elvis Mitchell, New York Times  (September 30, 2000)

"In the Mood for Love  has an exceptionally vivid sense of place. . . . It is a memory piece, . . . not in the past, but rather the memory of the past and the rendering of that memory in film. . . . What we see on the screen is less the depiction of an extra-marital affair than of its remains as they are re-envisioned and fetishized in the mind’s eye. . . . This film is not only a treatise on memory but also on the art of acting."
    - Amy Taubin, Sight and Sound  (November 2000)

"The film exists in a near-constant state of ellipsis; a great deal is felt but very little is said. Wong dances around the details of the initial adultery and later sidessteps the issue of what – if anything – happens between Su and Chow. Looks, gestures and even clothes stand in for what remains unspoken, with Wong employing a subtle array of stylistic devices – organized around a structure of ritual and repetition – to evoke repressed passion and wistful nostalgia. . . . In the Mood for Love  is sublime."
    - David Cox, i-D  (November 2000)